COLUMBIA (SC)
The Daily Caller
February 6, 2018
By Joshua Gill
A Baptist church in South Carolina settled a child sexual abuse lawsuit, agreeing to issue an apology, admit liability, and to pay $300,000 to the plaintiff.
Bryan Barnes, spokesman for First Baptist Church of Columbia, S.C., said that church leadership issued the apology and explained the terms of the settlement before the congregation on Sunday, according to the Baptist Press. The case involved a boy identified only as “Joel Doe” who alleged that Andrew McCraw, a volunteer in the church’s youth ministry, engaged in sexually inappropriate behavior with him when he was between the ages of 11 and 16.
“Today, we want to offer an apology for the inappropriate and unacceptable conduct this young man endured and express regret for what we failed to do to prevent it,” church leaders said, according to the outlet.
“No student should have to experience what this young man endured,” the church’s statement added.
Doe filed the lawsuit in October 2017 through his parents against First Baptist Church Senior Pastor Wendell Estep, and McCraw. The lawsuit alleged that McCraw initiated a relationship with Doe as a young adult mentor in a church youth program, but the relationship progressed in intimacy to inappropriate touching and sleepovers at McCraw’s house with no other adults or youths present.
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